 I now have the pleasure to introduce Karen and Danny Ellis from Australia, Mended, that's the name of their lovely organization, and there are retirees who are an active duo volunteering to share their knowledge and experience on the importance of refuse, reuse, reuse and repair. And we just live across the Tasman Sea. And now this is a wonderful opportunity for us to connect today, which is so exciting. I'm really looking forward to your presentation. Are you going to have a presentation or is it the two of you talking or how would you like to present? Yeah, it's just a Q&A from us, Brigitte, and anyone that's got any questions, we can certainly introduce ourselves a little bit more. And we'd love people to ask some questions. And even some of those questions that were asked of you, we can give an Aussie context to some of the questions that Elias was was asking about electrical repair, because we looked into that for the Productivity Commission's right to repair inquiry in this mission that we did to that. So we are a duo that goes around and repairs at repair cafes, but that has considerably reduced due to COVID. Before COVID, we were looking at about 31 community repair events a year. Since about 2015, we started on our mission about 2012. And we approached the local council to actually do something that you mentioned, Brigitte, to do a repair cafe at the local transfer station or recycling facility. So that was in 2012. And we were actually told, no, they weren't interested in that at that particular time. And we can sort of understand that a bit because we're ahead of our time, really. My team postman had just sort of, you know, in 2009 started repair cafes. So it was all brand new. And we weren't surprised, we got to know. But we did continue to advocate for community repair. And around 2015, we approached 2015, we approached our local health service to do a repair cafe in some community facilities. And that actually was was quite successful. We did that for about 18 months. And we we had great success. And it was all going swimmingly well, until the bureaucrats decided to step in and spoil the fun and want us all to sign five page contracts. And they literally were five page volunteer contracts, employment contracts, really. And we said no to that that wasn't in the spirit of neighborhood community repair. And we weren't prepared to do that. So that activity stopped for us. And that's when we hit the road, as amended Australia, and started traveling around to other municipalities to their repair cafes. And what we would do is we would just sign in and sign out and follow their health and safety procedures. And that was really great fun until of course, the pandemic hit. And during that time, what was really good, we used that time to write submissions to the productivity commissions, right to repair inquiry. And we did two submissions to that. And we also attended a hearing. And that was a bit of hard work, because, you know, we're retired, we have 10 grandchildren and another life other than community repair and right to repair. And during that time, Danny was suffering with a back injury. And I think I got sick, not with COVID, but I got sick. And it was all happening. And we were doing this right to repair submission or these right to repair submission. So, but well worth it, because we're passionate about repair. And we pushed through it. And it was really important during that time, not only to be campaigning for right to repair, but we did have an issue with electrical repair. And the electrical repair was that we'd go to repair cafes and people would be saying, Well, you're not electricians. How can you be repairing electrical items? And so I use that time during the Productivity Commission submission to actually research what our various states requirements were in relation to electrical repair. We knew that we weren't doing anything illegal in our state of Victoria, but we just wanted, like you, Brigitte, that official email saying yes or no and how to go about it. So we understand what you're doing at the moment. And what we found for anyone that is interested in Australia that all states, except Queensland, in all states, except Queensland, you can do electrical repair without being a licensed practicing electrician. And Northern Territory, that's another state, it's a territory, is the same as Queensland, with some some differences, but you can't repair there without being licensed electrician. So what's really great is that providing you competent and many of our repairers at repair cafes are quite competent. They've, like Danny, had an electrical background. He might be an electrician as such, but he's worked as an electrician's assistant for many years and has done a lot of electrical work at home for many years. So he's quite competent. And we find that there are repairers in our communities that have had similar experiences with electricity. And that's basically it for Mended Australia. I'm privileged enough to be on the Australian repair network as a member of the Steering Committee, which is such an honour, such a privilege, because our work goes further than just going to repair cafes. We are an activist for repair and campaigners for repair. And we support the right to repair by being on the Australian repair network, which launched this year at the Australian Repair Summit, which you presented at Brigitte, which was wonderful. And that's our second year of being involved in organising that summit along with Professor Leanne Wiseman, who is in Brussels at the moment, representing Australia. And our Trans-Tasman partnership, no doubt she'll be representing New Zealand as well. So that's that's Danny and myself. Danny, do you want to say anything that I might have missed? Oh, yeah, I'll just clarify with when Karen's talking about electrical, we're talking about appliances with a plug, not not hard wiring or anything like that. So any, any with a plug that people might come in, a lamp, toaster, kettle, whatever the case may be, in my state in Australia, if you deem yourself competent, you basically there's nothing to stop you pulling apart and trying to fix it. Because a lot of times it is really a mechanical issue, like a little plunger, not hitting a switch or a gears broken or something like that. And you basically got to dismantle the machine to get into it. So just because it's got a plug on the end doesn't mean that it's going to cause you any issues. It's only when you plug it in that you'll know that oh, it hasn't worked or it does work. So for me, it is a a work in progress because you're always learning as most fixes will probably save. And it's really good. It's a really good thing to do in retirement to pursue, I think, the the fixing, but also the awareness we like to create. Karen and I like to create the awareness and bring people along with us and educate them that, you know, just don't throw it away. You can maybe attempt to repair or find someone that could do that. And that's part of our goal is to make people aware that it's a problem too, I think, just not the people here today, but it's the whole community that can help move along and get the right to repair happening. Yeah. And so we have what we call Mendered Australia is our legacy project in retirement. We do want to leave a legacy that we've done something valuable with our time. And we share the passion for repair. I share the passion. I like to mend textiles and troubleshoot sewing machine issues. Danny does electrical mechanical. We've both grown up in that environment. So it's a really good project that we can do together. And we would encourage other retirees to if they are fixes to do this type of thing together. Yes. And I also learned a lot about sewing machines in the last four years from someone. But also to we're trying to get young people involved too. I think that's, I think that's one really important fact that we got to bring in, you know, the next generation and generation after that, get them on board and get them to understand that it's very important that we Sorry, we're not really computer literate and zoom literate. So we don't know how to stop this blurry background. It's like a Doris Day lens. It's hiding my wrinkles, isn't it? Masking my wrinkles. Oh, gosh, that maybe Danny can just stay together. So any questions from from anybody? Insurance insurance here Brigitte is is an issue. Elias was asking about insurance. The repair cafes and community repair groups here do struggle with the issue of insurance. What is quite good is that if repair cafes are held in community centers in Victoria that have insurance through the state government, that's really broad and that covers them entirely. And we can just sign in sign out and we're covered. Other other groups might have to be auspice to receive insurance through the auspice. Most councils don't really like to get involved because they don't want to ensure for for repair cafes were found that prefer that you're an incorporated group and that you seek insurance through your own means. They don't seem to want to support groups directly. So that you know that that is been an issue with us when we've approached council to actually have repair cafes in in a repair cafe in the local library. We did that in 2017. We thought I'll be great in our local area to do a repair cafe in the library. It probably would have been the first year in Australia. And they said no. Again probably related. They didn't say really why but probably related to risk again. Very risk adverse and looks like everybody has has that sort of issue with with council and bureaucrats and red tape. So yeah, that was a bit disappointing because libraries around the world now are embracing community repair and repair cafes, which we know about we read about. So we continue with our campaigning locally since 2012. But for 10 years, we haven't had any success. And we support we think that that might be now, you know, they're sort of over us. They're sort of a bit like, you know, you've been sort of doing this forever in a day. And we're just ignoring you now. And and look, maybe if they did it, they'd have egg on their face because because we tried so hard. And then they accept us like saying, Oh, okay, you can do it now. I don't think they'd probably want to, to give us that satisfaction. That's, that's unfortunate, because our community is missing out. But we keep trying for our community. And maybe some somebody in our community will will step up when when we leave our community, which might be too far in the future. It's also been my experience, too, is that there's a lot of people that having got the skills, but they still want to do something. And it's, I think it's the world over that they they'll come down and just volunteer. And that's another really good aspect of what we do. And it's, it's, it's one thing that, that you can do, but you also need that support. You also need that support from all these other people that will check people in, guide them around, sit at the tables and and and also the most people that come in, really interested. We haven't had too many, I suppose, Karen and I talk about the the users, I suppose. And what I mean by that, and I don't mean to offend anyone, but they sort of take it for granted, or I've got eight things. And if you're not very well organized, you'll find that there's someone smiling. They've got four fixes working online on all these stuff and is a cue. So yes, that's, that's why you really do need the the organizers, how valuable are they? So it's not just the repairers, it's the organizers. And it takes skill to be able to, you know, manage those sort of situations, even with textiles, you know, it's just simple repair. But in my situation, I've had, you know, people expecting you to upcycle three or four garments in a, in a 20 minute sort of do fittings and do actual fittings. So if you don't have the organizers on the ball at that front desk and then the roving person that goes around, you know, the roving person that goes around, you can be, you can be railroaded. So that's, that's very interesting. That they're our experiences with the many, many repair cafes that we've, we've attended. And you could write a book about about all the, all the experiences and maybe one day, when I've stopped all my activism, we're on Twitter. And that's where we campaign and quite, quite vocal in relation to write to repair and and repair in general. So if anyone is interested to see our work there, it's, it's a daily labor of love to be where we, our hashtag is voices for repair. But we also hashtag write to repair. And, you know, we're relentless, we keep at it. It's, it's the, it's something we can do as, as two people, we're not incorporated, we're not an organization. This is, this is completely separate to, to, to everything that, but it's so important, so very, very important. And to have that network, like yourself, Brigitte, to have the network of people like the ANWISE and the Australian Repair Network, people in like Nathan Proctor and Aaron Personowski in, in the States, Kyle Wines from iFixit, Lewis Rosman, the YouTuber, very, very important to, to keep in touch with those people, the UK, the Restart Project, write to repair Europe. Those people are invaluable to pushing the right to repair forward across the globe. It's not just us campaigning for Australian right to repair. We're so supportive of global right to repair as well. Yes, and we've always, we always push back, especially when Karen sees anything in the, in the paper, and we, we think it's a bit of greenwashing going on. We yell pretty loud when things like that come out, like especially so-called apples, repair rule, iPhone 14, you know, it's not repair rule, might be easy to pull apart, but you're getting bits and pieces and everything serialized. So you just can't do that. And whether it's you pulling apart a toaster or a kettle, the same thing we'll call out, we've called out Smeg the other week when the toaster failed again. This woman had, what, three? Yeah, she's on to a third Smeg toaster in a couple of years. And Smeg toasters are very expensive. So we'll call out the companies as well. We tag, tag the companies in. We're not afraid to do that. Recycling Victoria here, the state that we're in is big on recycling, but little and, and, you know, the rhetoric around the circular economy and all it is is recycling. We, we call that out. We want to see repair and reuse of, of items and repair and reuse facilities in Victoria that they have vision, but has haven't eventuated funding for recycling is seems to be getting is just continuing funding for more recycling. And that's not where we see the circular economy going in our work. Yeah, it's a difference. Yeah, it's like a missing these two other cogs in the wheel. They just do the recycling and they expect to advance down the track. But all they're doing is the same old same old. You've got to introduce those other two aspects of repair and reuse. And maybe they'll get where they would need to go. But at the end of the minute, all the funding just goes to recycling. If because I know we're probably short of time. If people want to follow our actual repairs, we're on Instagram. And I know you follow Brigitte. We follow you on Instagram. That's what we do basically at home. We're always every day. We're repairing something. So if people are interested in that practical at home tinkering, fixing, please, we're mend it Aussie on Instagram, we're mend it Aussie on Twitter for the campaigning right to repair. And we're on Facebook. And that's just basically where we go to repair when we go to repair cafes, or, you know, if we can promoting other repair cafes, our friends that run other repair cafes, if it that pops up, we'll share it on Facebook. So that's more event event related. And we also run the Facebook page right to repair Australia. And that started off with just us two. And in a couple of years, we've got nearly 700, I think, people following that. So that's right to repair Australia on Facebook. And that's just a collation of of articles and videos related to write, write to repair from across the world. So there's that. And yeah, how cool. This is fantastic. I mean, you dedicated a whole decade, the decade, you know, to this work, you know, and and look what you've achieved. It's incredible. Yeah, so commendable. I mean, I'm just so impressed. It's wonderful. And you seem to be traveling repairers, you know, across this huge country of Australia. And just, you know, it's just so inspiring, incredible. I mean, really like to applaud you. And I hope that maybe as some of the participants, you can also use your reaction function to applaud like I'm doing, we're getting really excited. It's something that's all love. That's, that's, that's lovely. Yeah. And it's, it's just, it means a lot to us. Thank you. And being invited to speak at Fix Fest by James. We're very honored and privileged. We thank James for the opportunity to share what we do. And our message is, you know, we are stronger in numbers, rather than working in silos. And that's why it's so important that this movement is global, that we have our trans Tasman partnership a bit closer to home, which we've already established. And that's, that's great. But we also need to consider everybody else and supporting everybody else in, in our push to, to legislate for right to repair. But also, you know, we're really active grandparents, and we have craft and ends with the children. And we, we, we share those on Instagram and on Facebook, to show that we're also trying to instill repair, the notion of repair in our children. That's really important, important to us too. And we're getting some successes there, even with our own family, who might have been a bit more throw away disposable. They're also coming to us now saying, can you fix this? Can you fix that? We're quite, quite busy doing those things as well with family. And if you can influence just family or one, one other person outside your family about repair, that's pretty amazing. I didn't understand that. Yeah, that's wonderful. And we will see you at International Repair Day. And I'm also, you know, we'll extend the invitation to perhaps for you to present at our online crowdfunding, if you like. So thank you. Oh, yes, we, we, you know, I love to do that. Thank you for the invite. And we're certainly coming out. You knew that didn't you that? Yeah, we're booked in. We're booked in. Yeah. And yeah, we were just happy to see what was happening. But well, we're extra happy to maybe present and chat about what we do. Thank you. Beautiful. Yeah, you too. And lovely to meet you today. Yeah, and thank you to all the people who have listened to our story. We appreciate that. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Bye now. Ka kite.